Riley Herbst, driver of the No. 98 Monster Power Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing, is feeling good forward of this weekend’s NASCAR Xfinity Collection playoffs curtain-raiser at Kansas Speedway.
“We undoubtedly have the pace to do it,” stated Herbst, who’s eighth within the standings, three factors up on the Spherical of 8 cutline. “I’ve obtained the very best workforce within the storage. We’re going to go do the very best we will each week, and attempt to execute and go win this championship.
“We really feel good. Kansas is an effective monitor for us. We’ve actually excelled within the mile and a half tracks this 12 months, so we’re excited to go to a very quick mile and a half monitor. The Kansas monitor has comparable traits to Las Vegas and Texas. Texas is one other monitor that we now have excelled at. It’s thrilling for us to get going.”
Following Kansas, the Xfinity Collection playoffs will head to Talladega, adopted by the not too long ago reconfigured Charlotte Roval
“The Roval goes to be fascinating as a result of it isn’t the identical monitor as we ran final 12 months,” stated Herbst. “It’s a brand new format. It’s going to be fascinating to see how all of us adapt to that new monitor and what goes on.”
Now in his fifth full-time season within the Xfinity Collection with a complete of 168 races run, Herbst has transitioned right into a mindset of having the ability to settle for what a automotive gives him on any given race day.
“I feel that we’ll have a possibility to go win this race at Kansas, and if that presents itself, we’re going to go for it,” stated Herbst. “Nevertheless, if that chance doesn’t current itself, I really feel like we’re simply going to take what the automotive offers us and attempt to have three actually strong races at Kansas, Talladega and Charlotte and attempt to transfer on to the subsequent spherical.”
Throwing a wrench into Riley Herbst’s 2024 post-season is the truth of not figuring out the place he’ll race come subsequent 12 months. Talking on the current Xfinity Collection playoff media day, Herbst, referring to the shuttering of Stewart-Haas Racing, admitted that he was “not assured” about what he could be doing come Daytona 2025.
“Yeah, it’s been robust, as a result of clearly Stewart-Haas Racing is closing down and going out of enterprise,” he stated. “But it surely’s additionally been good, as a result of we’ve all bonded collectively actually carefully and it’s form of just like the final dance for everyone. It’s been a great silver lining slightly bit, but it surely has undoubtedly been robust to beat. It bothered me lots earlier, however I really feel like now everyone knows what’s going on now, so the distraction is just not close to as unhealthy because it was. 2025 for me continues to be TBD. Hopefully, we will announce one thing right here quickly.”
Herbst has improved tremendously all through the final 5 Xfinity Collection seasons, and is now a multi-time race winner who can contend in any race he strains up. Improved consistency has performed a significant half in getting him to that stage.
“Yeah, we had been actually, actually good with consistency,” he stated. “Nevertheless, throughout the previous few weeks of the late summer time, we form of fell off our mark slightly bit. We had been fourth in factors going into the summer time break, and now we’re eighth. That’s form of irritating for us, however we’ll get again on monitor right here and we’ll go win this championship. We’re not happy. Hopefully, we will exit right here and do it. We’re nonetheless hungry. We nonetheless wish to win this championship. We additionally wish to win extra races this 12 months.
“We’ll see the place all the pieces settles on the finish of the 12 months. We’re wanting to get to the monitor this weekend and go dominate. If we do our job and execute, I feel all the pieces will work out nicely. We’re assured and we’ve obtained the pace.”
